You can find
amazing collections of butterflies all around the globe in the butterfly houses
listed below. Butterfly houses emerged in the late 1970s when it was found that
tropical conditions within greenhouses could be used as a home for the most
exotic and unusual butterfly species.
Vienna Schmetterlinghaus
The Vienna Schmetterlinghaus, or
Imperial Butterfly House, is right in the heart of the city on the edge of
Burggarten Park. The Butterfly House is one of the buildings of the Hofburg Palace, the home of the
Habsburgs of Austria until 1918. In the Burggarten (the Emperor’s Garden), they
built the Palm House, a greenhouse designed in 1901 in Art Nouveau style by
the architect Friedrich Ohmann. The Butterfly House was originally established
in 1990 at the Wustenhaus Schönnbrunn, before moving into the magnificent Palm
House in 1998. The huge glass domes of the Palm House were well-suited to house
exotic plants and waterfalls, with plenty of room for the butterflies to fly
freely. There are now around 400 butterflies at the Schmetterlinghaus.
Singapore Changi Airport Butterfly Garden
The Singapore
Airport Butterfly Garden is, unsurprisingly, the first to be based in
an airport. But Singapore Changi
Airport is also home to a swimming pool and cinema, as well as cactus,
sunflower, and orchid gardens. You will find the Butterfly Garden at Terminal 3
of the airport, with over 1000 butterflies representing 40 different species
native to Malaysia. The garden houses a six-meter-high waterfall, jungle
flowers, and greenery to keep the butterflies well-fed. It also features a
specially designed curved roof system that allows natural air to enter and
provides enough room for free flight. Walkways guide you through the garden,
which was opened to visitors in 2008.
Bornholm Butterfly Park
The Bornholm Butterfly Park lies
on the edge of Nexo on the picturesque Danish island of Bornholm in the Baltic
Sea. The Park features a tropical butterfly house in what was formerly a
hothouse, and an outdoor butterfly garden full of native species like the
Painted Lady, Orange Tip, and Red Admiral. The Bornholm Butterfly Park opened
in 1997 and now houses over 1000 butterflies, as well as tropical plants
brought in to provide the nectar the butterflies need. You can find chrysalises
amongst the plants and see butterflies like the Atlas Moth, Owl Butterfly, Large Tree Nymph, the
amazing Glasswing,
and the Peleides
Blue Morpho, native to Central America and the Caribbean.
Niagara Parks Butterfly Conservatory
The Butterfly
Conservatory is part of the Niagara Parks Botanical Gardens, a few
kilometers to the north of the Falls in Ontario,
Canada. The Conservatory was opened in 1996 and now houses around 2000
butterflies, representing 45 species. Many of these are brought from the
tropics in South Asia, Australia, and South America. Under its dome, the
Conservatory holds rainforest conditions, plants that feed the butterflies, and
an 180-meter pathway along which you can walk. At the Emergence Window, you can
see butterflies leaving their pupae and
start to take flight. Among the species on show are the Banded Orange, Gulf Fritillary, Sara Longwing, and
the Common
Mormon.
Entopia by Penang Butterfly Farm
Close to the town
of Teluk Bahang in the Malaysian state of Penang,
the award-winning Butterfly Farm was
set up in 1986 on a site stretching over eight hectares to focus on education,
research, and conservation of rare butterfly species whose natural habitat is
under threat. The Malay Peninsula is home to over a thousand butterfly species,
one of the highest concentrations in the world. And the Penang Butterfly Farm
is home to over 4000 butterflies from 120 species including rare and endangered
varieties like the Orange
Oakleaf, Yellow
Birdwing, and Rajah Brooke’s
Birdwing. It was the first butterfly house in the world to be situated
within the tropics. Over 300 plant varieties are used to keep the butterflies
fed.
Butterfly World
Butterfly World in Coconut
Creek, Florida,
was the first and is still the largest butterfly house in the USA. Opened in
1988, it was founded by Ronald Boender, who took inspiration from the emergence
of butterfly houses in the UK, in particular, the now-closed London Butterfly
House. There are several butterfly aviaries allowing free flight, a butterfly
farm and research center, botanical gardens and aviaries for hummingbirds.
Butterfly World is closely involved with education and breeding programs. It
works with the University of Florida to re-introduce the endangered Schaus
Swallowtail to the state. Over the course of a year, 150 species are
on show at Butterfly World.
Stratford Butterfly Farm
In the center of
the handsome town of Stratford-upon-Avon on the banks on the Avon, Stratford Butterfly Farm opened
in 1985, one of the first tropical butterfly houses in the world. The huge
greenhouse is packed with a landscape of waterfalls, tropical plants, and
ponds. Among the tropical plants is the lantana, a
weed packed with nectar that is a perfect food for the butterflies. There
is a caterpillar room to see the early stages of the life cycle, an insect
room, and the flight room where you’ll find over 250 different species of
butterfly from 20 different countries. Many are bred at Stratford, and some are
imported from the tropics from conservation projects.
Schloss Sayn Butterfly Garden
You can find
butterfly gardens at many country houses today. Blenheim Palace and Longleat
have their own butterfly houses, for example. One of the finest of this type
lies in Germany, at Schloss Sayn, on the
banks of the Rhine. It is located north of the city of Koblenz, where the
800-year-old castle stands close to a restored palace within a romantic
landscape garden. The butterfly house was founded in 1987 by Princess Gabriela
zu Sayn-Wittgenstein. There are banana trees and palms providing food to
butterflies that come from South Asia, Africa and South America, including the
Owl Butterly, Atlas Moth, and Blue Morpho. There are also areas devoted to
caterpillars, with resident iguanas and Chinese Dwarf quails, and an
insectarium.
Australian Butterfly Sanctuary
Situated in
Kuranda, half an hour from Cairns in the north of Queensland,
the Australian Butterfly
Sanctuary was created in 1987 and is still the largest butterfly house
in the country. The Sanctuary has over 1,500 tropical butterflies, all of them
local species from Australia kept in the aviary with replicated rainforest
conditions. You can take tours of the aviary and see the butterflies in flight,
and be guided through the laboratory and breeding area. The labs breed over
30,000 caterpillars every year and have previously managed to nurture the
huge Hercules
Moth. Among the butterflies on show are the Kuranda Butterfly, the Ulysses Butterfly, and
the Cairns
Birdwing.
The Butterfly Pavilion
The Butterfly Pavilion in
Westminster, Colorado boasts
of being the first stand-alone, non-profit invertebrate zoo in the whole USA.
It was set up in 1995 by the Rocky Mountain Butterfly Consortium, with a
7,200-square-foot tropical butterfly house, and areas for other animals. The
butterfly house is monitored to recreate rainforest conditions for species from
around the world, with 600 to 1000 chrysalises coming into The Butterfly
Pavilion labs every week from farms in the tropics. There are plenty of
Colorado native species on show, along with exotic types like the African Blue-Banded
Swallowtail, Pink Rose, Paper Kite, Scarlet
Mormon, Blue
Glassy Tiger and the African Moon Moth.